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Chapter 1: Alleyways
Attention citizens of Jump City: As of today, all metahumans must be reported to be detained for testing and interrogation. Please call 911 if you see a meta. Thank you.
METAHUMANS HAVE BEEN IDENTIFIED!
Over the past several weeks officials have been undercover to find the city's metahumans. As of yesterday, five have been discovered and identified. While none of them are in custody, officials have released their files which include name, ability, appearance, where they were last seen, and what to do if one encounters he/she.
The night was cold and uninviting. In the distance police sirens could be heard. Dogs barked at each other. The wind blew calmly, and the puddles on the ground reflected the full moon up above. The street was lined with tall buildings, mostly businesses and a few restaurants, which were all closed by now. This part of the city was mostly deserted at this time of the night, except for a few strays and rats. A cat trotted across the street, running behind a trashcan. Away from sight-though it wouldn't matter since no one was around anyway-the cat began to change. Its body began to take the form of a male human, with green skin and hair, pointed ears and a fang that stuck out from the bottom lip. He wore jeans and a sweatshirt, with a beanie covering most of his hair.
"It's all clear, Kory" the boy, who looked to be in his teenage years said to what seemed like no one.
From behind a trashcan, another person emerged. She looked about the same age as the boy, but was much taller in comparison. She had red hair and green eyes, and wore a pair of pants with a shirt and jacket. She looked normal, other than the fact that the whites of her eyes were green. The girl walked to the boy and they began walking out of the alley. They continued to walk forward, not saying a word, until they reached another alley. The boy stayed outside of the alley on the sidewalk, while the girl went into the alley, stopping next to a dumpster.
"It is safe to exit." she said to something near the dumpster. This time, two people rose from the side. A girl and a boy, who also looked to be in their adolescent years, joined the other two who waited outside the alley. The girl wore a sweatshirt and pants, with a hat covering most of her head. Under the streetlight, her gray skin and purple hair became noticeable. The boy, who was slightly taller than her, had black hair and fair skin, and wore a jacket over a blue shirt as well as jeans. The four teens walked together towards one more alley, where once again, they whispered to a dumpster and waited for their friend to show up. He was tall and had a muscular build, and wore jeans and a sweatshirt, as well as sunglasses, even though it was nighttime.
"I'm getting real tired of hiding behind dumpsters" the tall boy with the sunglasses-better known as Victor Stone-said to his friends while keeping his eyes forward.
"Me too. My back hurts from crouching all day" the green boy-Garfield Logan-replied.
"I also do not enjoy the hiding behind trashcans. It is quite hard to sit still all day" the red-headed girl, also known as Koriand'r, or Kory Anders, said. The boy with the black hair sighed to himself and looked down at the sidewalk.
"We don't have a choice. This is our only option."
"But can't we at least hide somewhere more comfortable?" Garfield asked.
"We can't hide anywhere else" the boy, Dick Grayson, replied.
"Dick has a point. We can't hide anywhere else without being noticed" the purple-haired girl, Rachel Roth, added. The group turned a corner, until they reached one more alley, where Rachel, Victor, Garfield, and Kory hid behind more trashcans and dumpsters. Dick continued forward, and went into a convenience store that was open 24 hours. He came back out later, with two bags filled with groceries. He went back into the alley where his friends waited.
"Bread, cereal, and granola bars again tonight. A couple water bottles should be in there too." Dick said to his four friends, who moaned and muttered collectively. He passed the bags around for his friends to take what they wanted.
"I'm getting tired of this too." Victor said as he opened the box of granola bars and started passing them around.
"You know we can't have anything else. We don't have utensils and this type of food lasts longer."
The five teens ate quietly and packed the remaining food in the plastic bags. They exited the alley and continued to walk. Few cars passed, and if they did the drivers hadn't seen their strange appearances. There was a construction site up ahead for a new museum, though it was far from done. The frame was complete, with the walls mostly put up as well, however finishing the roof as well as the interior of the building would take months to complete. The group walked past the building itself, and made its way towards the porta potties.
"Now this, I just can't stand" Victor complained.
"It's the only way we won't be found, unless you want to pee in a bush" Dick said, but also gagged when he opened the door.
"We really need to find someplace to stay. Living like this sucks" Garfield said as they went back to the alleyways. There was an apartment building with stairways on the outside, which the group climbed up to the top.
"Well get used to it, I doubt we'll find a safe city anytime soon" Dick replied as he took off his jacket and rolled it up into a pillow.
Rachel pulled the hood of her sweatshirt up and said quietly, "I doubt we'll find a safe city ever."
In the early hours of the morning, the teens awoke. They groaned from the pain of sleeping on the hard surface of the rooftop, and went back down to the ground the same way they came up.
"Vic and Kory, you two stick together today. Gar, Rachel, and I can be on our own. I'll see you guys again tonight, and Gar, you're in charge of scoping out the neighborhood." Dick waved to his friends and went down another street into his assigned alleyway. Victor, Kory, and Rachel went to their assigned locations as well. As Garfield was on his own walking down the street, he kept his head down and his hood up to cover his green skin and hair.
Remember what Dick said, keep your head down and try not to get noticed. If I just don't draw attention to myself, I'll make it to the alley just fine.
This was a conversation Garfield had a lot with himself. He had it everyday, while walking to the alley. The other four as well as himself had had a scare numerous times, either by a person pointing out their strange features, or someone recognizing them from the newspaper. The citizens in Jump City were pretty jumpy when it came to people who were different. Or in Garfield and his friends' case-metahumans.
It was the same as discrimination against a religion, race, or gender, but no one realized it, except for the metahumans- metas, as they were called in short. It wasn't that metas weren't allowed to do certain things or had rules that only applied to them; it was the way they were looked at. Whenever a metahuman entered a store or a restaurant, they were stared at, pointed at, and sometimes people even threw things at them, spit at them, or shouted profanities at them. This wasn't anything new in the world-it had been going on since the first metahumans were born. People weren't belittling them out of hatred, they were belittling them out of fear. They knew the metahumans had special abilities, which made them capable of hurting a regular human easily. Some of them did commit crimes, and turn to the side of evil, making a bad name for all the rest who didn't abuse their powers and laid low. Because of this, there was now a law that all metahumans must be turned in to be tested on, now making it impossible for them to be in public at all.
There were a few exceptions for metas. Dick Grayson, for example, had no metahuman abilities. He was, however, more intelligent and far more clever than most people, making him fall into the metahuman category. He also had certain skills such as being a fantastic gymnast, and his reflexes were almost thought to be psychic abilities.
The five teens had been living in several places throughout their time of knowing each other. There was a young couple that sympathized them, and gave them clothes, food, and water, however they eventually moved when they had gotten a job offer in another state. Another time, the group had lived in an abandoned warehouse, but they soon had to leave as it was going to be torn down and replaced by a shopping mall.
The only people around at this hour were early morning runners or employees with early shifts, but they still worried. One time two women who were going for a morning run had noticed some of Rachel's hair sticking out of her hood. Luckily, they assumed it to be dyed. Another time a man walking his dog had given Victor a funny look when he noticed a red light shining through his sunglasses. He dismissed it as merely being a strange reflection of the sun. Garfield however, had it the worst. His green skin was nearly impossible to hide, so he had to hurry to his assigned alleyway. When he was a few feet from it, he would slow down to make it seem casual that a boy was walking into an alleyway that had nothing but a few garbage cans and a dumpster in it.
Garfield sat crossed legged at the side of a dumpster, leaning his head against the brick wall behind him. He sighed and stared at the sky, listening to the city begin to liven up. The traffic started to get louder as people started driving to work. He started seeing shadows of people walking past the alley, and heard people chatting. He sighed and closed his eyes to sleep.
When Garfield awoke, it was sunset. He shifted a little to try and get more comfortable, and waited for the sun to go down and the streets to become empty. When the moon was up and most activity on the streets came to a standstill, he got up from his sitting position. He tried transforming into a cat, and when that didn't work, he tried turning into a dog, which also failed. He tried turning into other animals, such as a fly, rat, or bird, but to no avail. The group had only been doing this routine for a few weeks, and before then they had barely used their powers. Because of this, Garfield could not always exit the alley in a disguise, but have to scope out the streets in human form.
He left the alley and walked towards the one Rachel would be hiding in. He kept his eyes down at the ground, with his hands in his pockets. He didn't notice what was going on around him until he heard the voices of teenage boys and girls. He looked up and saw a group of them, about five or so, leaning against a wall chatting casually. He looked down again, only to look up when they noticed him.
"Did you see that? That guy had green skin."
"That's nasty."
"He must be a meta."
"Wonder what kind of weird shit he can do." The teenagers laughed slightly, trying to make sure Garfield didn't hear them. He considered himself lucky that the people who spotted him didn't bother calling the cops. He got to the alley where Rachel was waiting, and found her asleep with her head leaning against the wall. He chuckled slightly to himself and nudged her with his foot.
"Coast is clear Rae" he said as she stood up slowly, still hardly awake.
"I'm going to go get Victor and Kory, you can find Dick and meet us at the corner" Rachel said and started walking away.
"We still have enough food for tonight right Dick?" Garfield said to his friend as they walked side by side to the corner where they were supposed to meet the others.
"We should be fine for the next day or two."
They continued to walk in silence until they got to an intersection where they had to cross the street. There were several cars out, and the boys watched as they drove by. Two boys walked from behind them and joined in waiting for the light to indicate that pedestrians could cross. They were both carrying grocery bags, two on each arm. One of them had orange looking hair, the other had bright ketchup red hair. The boy with bright red hair started looking around as he waited for the light to change, then appeared to catch a glimpse of Garfield. He furrowed his brow in confusion for a moment, then elbowed his friend in the arm and nodded towards the green teen. When his friend saw what his friend was referring to he cocked his head to the side in thought, but was interrupted by the light beeping and the three other boys beginning to cross the street. Garfield and Dick turned right after they got across, but the other two boys continued straightforward.
"Roy, did you see that? That kid had green skin!" said the ketchup haired boy, Wally West.
"Yeah, I think he was in the paper with the pictures of metahumans to look out for."
"Can't believe we never noticed him before. I mean, he has green skin. You'd think we would've spotted that."
"Did you recognize his friend? I didn't get a good look at him. He could be a meta too."
"I only saw that he had black hair and pale skin. But otherwise he didn't look familiar."
"He's probably helping the green guy out. Must be sympathetic to metas." They continued down the street, until they came upon some apartment buildings with fences in between them. The ketchup haired boy put his grocery bags down, looking around cautiously before vibrating his molecules and walking through the fence. Once on the other side, Roy began handing the bags to him over the fence, then climbed over it himself. They picked up their bags and walked down the alleyway until they came across a basement door. It was locked from the inside, so Roy knocked nine times in a specific rhythm until it opened.
The boys walked down the stairs and were greeted by their friends. After setting down the food and letting the others begin eating, Roy and Wally pulled one of their friends aside. She had black hair and dark skin, as well as wings on her back.
"Karen, we saw another meta on the way back home. I think he was in the paper" Wally said to the group's leader.
"There was someone with him but we couldn't get a good look at him to tell whether or not he was from the article too" Roy added.
"They only found five so far right? None of us have been discovered yet, so this must mean there are other metas out there that need help" Wally cut back in.
"We aren't taking in any more people, the place is packed as it is. I don't want to risk any of you being found" Karen said sternly.
"That's what you said last time. Then we found Joey" Roy said, causing Karen's expression to soften at the memory of the sweet boy looking pleadingly at her to let him stay.
"Be on the lookout for them."
Thank you for reading, and I hope I can post the next chapter soon. Tell me what you think!